In the summer of 1988, a grim discovery was made on the on-ramp to Interstate 64 from South Military Highway in Chesapeake, Virginia. The decomposed body of 26-year-old Joseph Alex Ray, a White/Caucasian male, was found on July 19th. He had been last seen a week earlier, on July 12, 1988. Due to the advanced state of decomposition, investigators were initially unable to determine a definitive cause of death. However, his case is listed by the city of Chesapeake as a homicide by strangulation.
The circumstances surrounding Ray's death were unsettling, and the case quickly became a cold case homicide investigation. Investigators looked into potential links to a string of similar murders in the Hampton Roads area at the time. Authorities formed a task force to investigate a suspected serial killer believed to be responsible for the deaths of at least ten men between 1987 and 1995. The victims, including Ray, were often found nude and strangled in secluded areas across Chesapeake, Suffolk, and Isle of Wight County. Many of the victims were known to have ties to the gay community and were frequent hitchhikers.
A potential suspect in this series of killings was Elton Manning Jackson, known as 'The Hampton Roads Killer.' Jackson was convicted for the 1996 murder of Andrew D. Smith and is suspected in the deaths of at least 11 other men whose cases share similarities with Ray's. While Joseph Alex Ray's death fits the pattern of Jackson's suspected victims, no public information has officially linked Jackson to Ray's murder. The investigation into the death of Joseph Alex Ray remains open and unsolved, with no arrests made or specific suspects charged in his case.
